About the Author

William Frejhas an academic background and professional experience in architecture and city planning with degrees from the University of Arizona and U.C. Berkeley. In the mid-1980s he and his wife traveled extensively in the mountain regions of Nepal, Pakistan and northern India. He then served as a career diplomat with the US Agency for International Development (USAID), living and working in Indonesia, Poland, Kazakhstan, and Afghanistan. His photographic work is represented in numerous public and private collections throughout the world and has been featured in a number of exhibitions at galleries and museums. Frej is the author of four multi-award-winning books: Maya Ruins Revisited: In the Footsteps of Teobert Maler (Peyton Wright/University of Oklahoma Press, 2020); Seasons of Ceremonies: Rites and Rituals in Guatemala and Mexico (Museum of New Mexico Press, 2021); Travels Across the Roof of the World: A Himalayan Memoir (George F. Thompson Publishing, 2022); and Blurred Boundaries: Perspectives on Rock Art of the Greater Southwest (Museum of New Mexico Press, 2023). The Lowell Thomas Travel Journalism Competition awarded a Silver Medal to Travels Across the Roof of the World in 2023.

About the Contributors

Anne Frej is an urban planner and real estate consultant who focused on historic preservation, downtown revitalization plans, and market feasibility studies for commercial real estate developments in the U.S., Indonesia, Central Europe and Central Asia. At the Urban Land Institute (ULI) in Washington, DC she was the project director and primary contributor to books published by ULI including Green Office Buildings: A Practical Guide to Development (2005). She was co-author of Travels Across the Roof of the World: A Himalayan Memoir and a contributor to Maya Ruins Revisited: In the Footsteps of Teobert Maler and Seasons of Ceremonies: Rites and Rituals in Guatemala and Mexico.

Dr. Michael E. Smith is Professor of Archaeology in the School of Human Evolution & Social Change at Arizona State University (ASU) and affiliated faculty at ASU’s School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning. He has two major research themes: (1) Archaeological research: Smith is currently Director of the ASU Teotihuacan Research Laboratory in Mexico. He has excavated at numerous Aztec provincial sites in Mexico, addressing provincial life, economics, inequality, and urbanism. (2 ) Comparative urbanism: Smith participates in several innovative transdisciplinary research projects on topics of comparative urbanism, neighborhoods, and urban sustainability. Smith is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He has published eleven books and more than 100 articles on his research. His book, At Home With the Aztecs: An Archaeologist Uncovers Their Daily Life (Routledge, 2016), won the Best Popular Book award from the Society for American Archaeology. His most recent book is Urban Life in the Distant Past: The Prehistory of Energized Crowding (Cambridge University Press, 2023).